No. 25 Ohio State vs. Illinois Fighting Illini – Ohio State Buckeyes
11/8/1999 12:00:00 AM | Football
Nov. 8, 1999
Weekly Press Conference
A QUICK LOOK AT THE MATCHUP
The Ohio State Buckeyes host the Illinois Fighting Illini Saturday, Nov. 13, in the final home game of the season and the final game in Ohio Stadium as we have known it for 78 years. Following the the game, construction crews will move in and start a variety of between-season construction projects during Phase II of the renovation, most notably the lowering of the field 14 feet 6 inches and an addition to the east side C Deck. Completion must be in time for the start of the 2000 home opener, Sept. 2 against Fresno State. The Ohio State vs. Illinois game will be televised by espn2 and is scheduled to kick off at 12:10 p.m. The Buckeyes enter the contest with a 6-4 record and a 3-3 mark in the Big Ten Conference after the 23-7 loss at Michigan State Saturday. Illinois, under third-year head coach Ron Turner, is enjoying a five-year best 5-4 season and is coming off a 40-24 win at Iowa that improved its Big Ten record to 2-4. Both Illini wins have come on the road, with the other a huge, 35-29, win at Michigan Oct. 23 after trailing 27-7 in the third quarter.
THE WINNER BECOMES BOWL ELIGIBLE
Both teams are fighting to become bowl eligible. Ohio State, which has played in a bowl game 10-consecutive years but will have its streak of five-consecutive New Year’s Day bowl games snapped, needs seven wins this season to go bowling because of its appearance in the preseason Kickoff Classic. Illinois, needing six wins, is in search of its first bowl appearance since playing in the 1994 Liberty Bowl.
PEACE PIPES & WOODEN TURTLES
Ohio State and Illinois play for the “Illibuck,” trophy, a tradition since 1925. The first “Illibuck” was a live turtle. It died in 1927 and was replaced by a wooden replica. Ohio State has won the last four “Illibuck” trophies and has an all-time lead of 52-20-2 in the “Illibuck” series. Members of the two school’s junior honorary societies – Bucket and Dipper at Ohio State and Sachem at Illinois – meet at halftime of each OSU/Illinois game to smoke a peace pipe and present the “Illibuck” trophy to the winner of the previous season’s game.
RADIO FREQUENCIES
The game will be broadcast around Ohio on the 71-station Ohio State Radio Network with Sports Radio 1460 (AM) The Fan the flagship station. Calling the action and in his second year as play-by-play announcer is Paul Keels. He is assisted by third-year analyst Jim Lachey. Jim Karsatos, in his 11th season on the team, provides sideline commentary.
WORLD WIDE WEB BROADCASTS
The game can be heard world wide via the internet simply by logging on to ohiostatebuckeyes.com.
SALUTING 14 BUCKEYE SENIORS
Saturday will mark the final home appearance and the final walk through the famed tunnel for 14 Ohio State seniors. Members of the senior class this year have been a part of three New Year’s Day Bowl games and two victories (the 1997 Rose Bowl win over Arizona State and the 1999 Sugar Bowl win over Texas A&M), two No. 2 national finishes, 38 victories, two Big Ten Conference co-championships and a “gold pants” win over Michigan. (See page three for the notes on the 14 seniors.)
NATION’S No. 1 RECRUITING CLASS
OSU’s Fourth-year seniors – those that did not red-shirt – were part of the No. 1 recruiting class in the nation in 1996. Andy Katzenmoyer and David Boston, 1999 first-round NFL Draft picks, are already gone from that class. The recruits that year included Gary Berry, Ben Gilbert, Kurt Murphy and Michael Wiley (all seniors) and red-shirted juniors Joe Brown, Na’il Diggs, Brent Johnson, Dan Stultz, Tyson Walter, Clinton Wayne and Jerry Westbrooks.
DIGGS & PLUMMER FOR MAJOR HONORS
Ohio State features 11 players who are in their first year as a starter, including seven freshmen or sophomores, but the Buckeyes also feature two All-America and major award candidates in junior linebacker Na’il Diggs and senior cornerback Ahmed Plummer. Diggs, a semifinalist for the Butkus Award and the Football News Defensive Player of the Year Award, has 78 tackles (second to Gary Berry’s 80) and team-best totals of 14 tackles-for-loss, five sacks and three forced fumbles. Plummer, one of 12 semifinalists for the Thorpe Award who also has been awarded an $18,000 National Football Foundation Scholarship, has team-highs of five interceptions and seven pass break-ups. The academic All-America candidate has 14 career interceptions. Both Diggs and Plummer were selected as preseason All-Americans.
STULTZ NAMED TO GROZA LIST
Junior kicker Dan Stultz is one of 20 semifinalists for the Lou Groza Award which is awarded to the nation’s outstanding place kicker. Stultz is 11-of-14 in field goals this season (after hitting 15-of-25 last year) and has made nine of his last 10 attempts, including five-consecutive from 40 yards and beyond.
KEEP AN EYE ON THESE BUCKEYES
In addition to Na’il Diggs and Ahmed Plummer defensively for the Buckeyes, first-year starter and sophomore Nate Clements (third with 76 tackles and second with six pass break-ups) has had a terrific season stepping in for departed Thorpe Award winner Antoine Winfield. Sophomore tackles Mike Collins (leads all linemen with 45 tackles and 10 tackles-for-loss) and Ryan Pickett (42 tackles, seven tackles-for-loss and three sacks), are becoming the anchors of a line that also features emerging defensive end James Cotton (48 tackles, nine tackles-for-loss). Offensively, quarterback Steve Bellisari has thrown for 1,399 yards and nine touchdowns with six interceptions. He is also second on the team with 293 rushing yards. He throws to a pair of first-year starters in junior receivers in Reggie Germany (39 receptions, 15.3 yards per catch, one touchdown) and Ken-Yon Rambo (38 receptions, 20.5 yards per catch, six touchdowns). Michael Wiley, who is seventh at Ohio State all-time with 2,731 career rushing yards and has scored 31 touchdowns, leads the rushing game with 732 yards and nine touchdowns.
OHIO STADIUM RENOVATION PHASE II
Phase II of the $187 million Ohio Stadium renovation will commence following the Illlinois game. The three-year project will improve aisle widths, seating for the disabled, food service and restroom facilities, escalator and elevator services, as well as increase seating capacity to about 97,000 fans. The project will be completed in time for the 2001 football season and it is the first extensive renovation of Ohio Stadium since it was built in 1922. Renovations that will take place over the course of the next 10 months will include:
* New east-side C Deck stands and facade,
* Lowering the field 14 feet 6 inches,
* New A Level seats to the field,
* Permanent South Stands,
* New lockerroom facilities,
* New post game press conference rooms,
* New 175-foot high scoreboard
* New east-side concourse
Last summer construction crews removed the track that surrounded the field for 77 years and completed one of the most crucial aspects of the project: the building around the field of a slurry wall of impermeable concrete, about three feet wide and from ground level to bedrock (40 feet).
OHIO STATE IN THE RANKINGS
Ohio State is ranked 25th in this week’s Associated Press poll, but has dropped out of the ESPN/USA Today Top 25 poll. The AP ranking continues a string of 71-consecutive weeks with a Top 25 national ranking, dating to the 1994 season. The last time Ohio State was not ranked by the AP was in the Nov. 6, 1994 polls.
OHIO STATE’S SEASON SO FAR
Ohio State, which is averaging 342.0 yards per game (ninth in the Big Ten) and allowing 370.0 (seventh), has trailed in every game this season. And with a 6-4 record, it will have its string of consecutive 10-or-more win seasons snapped at four and its consecutive New Year’s Day bowl games snapped at five. OSU opened the season with a 23-12 loss to No. 13 Miami in the Kickoff Classic but followed with wins over No. 13 UCLA (42-20), Ohio (40-16) and Cincinnati (34-20). Then came the Wisconsin nightmare in Ohio Stadium (OSU led 17-6 at halftime only to lose 42-17). The Buckeyes rebounded with a come-from-behind win over Purdue in a driving rain, limiting Drew Brees to no touchdown passes and to his second-fewest passing yards as a starter (205). The good feelings of that win ended the following week with a 23-10 loss at No. 2 Penn State. Back-to-back wins at Minnesota (20-17) and over Iowa (41-11) left OSU with a 6-3 overall record and confidence heading into the game last week at Michigan State. The win overMinnesota featured second-half comebacks from 10-7 and 17-14 deficits and an improved rushing game was evident the last half of the Minnesota game and all game against Iowa (354 yards those six quarters). A rested Michigan State team wasn’t impressed and its defense dominated in a 23-7 win last week that left the Buckeyes 6-4 overall and in need of a win to go bowling.
HISTORY: OHIO STATE vs. ILLINOIS
The game this week will mark the 88th game in the Ohio State/Illinois rivalry dating to the initial game in 1902. It also marks the 86th-consecutive season the two schools have met, dating to 1914. The Buckeyes lead the all-time series, 56-27-4, and have won the last four games by a combined score of 171-9. Illinois has had its share of success against Ohio State, however, and particularly in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Illinois defeated Ohio State five straight games between 1988 and 1992 and then did it again in 1994 with four of those games played in Ohio Stadium.
Buckeyes/Illini Notebook. . .
* The 86-consecutive year streak of games between Ohio State and Illinois is the eighth-longest continuous rivalry in NCAA history and second-longest in the Big Ten (Minnesota and Wisconsin have played 93-consecutive years).
* The two teams will meet Nov. 11, 2000 in Champaign.
* Ohio State is a modest 26-16-4 vs. Illinois in Ohio Stadium, but 29 11 in Champaign and 2-0 on neutral sites.
* John Cooper-coached Ohio State teams lost the first five games, and six of the first seven, against Illinois, including 31-12, 31-20, 18-16 and 24-10 losses at Ohio Stadium in ’88, ’90, ’92 and ’94, respectively.
* Cooper’s Buckeyes have followed that 1994 loss with convincing wins the last four years: 41-3, 48-0, 41-6 and 41-0, respectively.
’43 GAME: SEVEN LEAD CHANGES
One of the great games in the Ohio State/Illinois rivalry came in 1943. OSU’s Homecoming game win (29-26) featured seven lead changes and a last play, game-winning 22-yard field goal by Paul Stungis…after both teams had to be called back onto the field. The gun had sounded on the final play of the 26-all game and both teams dashed to their respective locker rooms. But Illinois’ left tackle had been spotted offside by the head linesman, who dropped his hat at the point of infraction. Both teams returned. Illinois was penalized five yards. News photographers had 12 minutes to set up for the final play. Stungis, a freshman, was perfect on his field goal attempt.
COOL DIGITS
00:00 – Time left in the 1997 game at Ohio Stadium when an OSU walk-on quarterback fumbled on the last play and Illinois’ Trevor Starghill returned the ball 38 yards for the only Illinois touchdown in a 41-6 game.
16 – Consecutive quarters Ohio State’s defense has kept Illinois from scoring a touchdown, dating to the fourth quarter of the 1994 game.
24 – Points OSU trailed by in the second quarter of the 1984 game with Illinois at Ohio Stadium. The Buckeyes came back to record a 45-38 win.
40 – Approximate yards Keith Byars ran shoeless on a 67-yard touchdown run in ’84 vs. Illinois. Byars finished with a school-record 274 yards rushing and an OSU record-tieing five touchdowns.
314 – School-record rushing total Eddie George had in the 1995 win over Illinois at Ohio Stadium.
SPARTANS SLAM DOOR AGAIN
Michgan State continued its quest for a New Year’s Day bowl game and ended Ohio State’s with a 23-7 win “that wasn’t as close as the score indicated,” said John Cooper. The Spartans got all the offense they needed from quarterback Bill Burke, who threw for 174 yards and two touchdowns, both coming in the second quarter. Plaxico Burris caught a key 17-yard touchdown on a third- and-goal play and Chris Baker caught a 1-yarder on fourth-and-goal. Three Paul Edinger field goals accounted for the rest of MSU’s points. OSU’s only score was set up by its defense. Ahmed Plummer intercepted a Burke pass early in the third quarter and returned it 37 yards. Eleven yards in MSU penalties on the play moved the ball to the 3. Two plays later Steve Bellisari found Michael Wiley for a 4-yard touchdown play. OSU was stopped cold by the MSU defense the entire game. The Buckeyes totalled four first downs, zero rushing yards and 79 total yards. The rushing total was the fewest since a minus-22-yard afternoon in 1965 against Michigan State. The total offense figure was the lowest since gaining 63 against Penn State in 1964.
ON THE DEFENSIVE
Ohio State’s defense was on the field for over 38 minutes Saturday but gave great effort the entire game, considering the Spartans started nine drives above their own 40 yard line. Two miscues – the third-and-goal play from the 17 and the fourth-and-goal play where Bill Burke should of been sacked but was able to elude the tackle – accounted for the two touchdowns scored against the OSU defense. The Spartans gained 301 total offensive yards on the day.
FRESHMAN DOSS SHINES
Michael Doss stood out vs. the Spartans on a day where there weren’t many good things happening for the Buckeyes. The freshman strong safety, who has been getting more and more playing time off the bench the past three weeks, totalled 12 tackles, including 10 in the second half. His total included seven solo tackles, which tied Gary Berry and Jason Ott for high-game honors. Berry led the Buckeyes with 13 tackles and Ott finished with 10.
PLUMMER PADS PICK TOTAL
Ahmed Plummer, a Thorpe Award semifinalist and the recipient of a prestigious National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame Scholarship, has recorded interceptions in the last two games to increase his season total to five and his career total to 14. He needs one more intercepton to tie Neal Colzie for fifth-place all-time at Ohio State.
DIGGS THIS
Na’il Diggs is just one sack away from OSU’s all-time Top 5 in sacks. The junior, all-Big Ten last year as a sophomore and a preseason All-American this year, has 17 career sacks. He also has 37 tackles-for-loss to rank seventh at Ohio State.
WILEY NEARING 3,000 & 4,000 YARDS
Michael Wiley has climbed into seventh-place on OSU’s prestigious Top 10 rushing list with 2,731 career yards. He needs 269 to reach 3,000. He needs 268 yards for 1,000 this season and thus make him one of five OSU backs with back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons. The others: Eddie George (1994-95), Keith Byars (1983-84), Tim Spencer (1981-82) and Archie Griffin (1973-75). Wiley’s all-purpose yardage total has grown to 3,917 (eighth at Ohio State) and leaves him just 83 yards from 4,000.
RAMBO REACHES 1,000 RECEIVING YARDS
Ken-Yon Rambo has reached 1,000 career receiving yards. His career totals: 50 receptions for 1,002 yards and seven touchdowns. Partner Reggie Germany has 54 career receptions for 844 yards and five touchdowns.
KEY 1999 BUCKEYE STATS & NOTES
Ohio State starts two seniors on defense and five on offense. It has first-year starters at five defensive positions (T Mike Collins, LB’s Courtland Bullard and Jason Ott, and defensive backs Nate Clements and Donnie Nickey) and at six offensive spots (QB Steve Bellisari, G LeCharles Bentley, T Henry Fleming, receivers Reggie Germany and Ken-Yon Rambo and the tight end tandem of Steve Wisniewski and Kevin Houser). The Buckeyes have trailed in every game this season, but have come back to win six times. Statistics that jump out: Opponents have more first downs (190 to 171) and control the football almost six minutes longer per game (32:56 to 27:03). The Buckeyes lost at least one fumble in nine of the first 10 games, part of the reason OSU trails in turnovers/takeaways, 23 to 20. Ohio State converts on 88 percent of its redzone opportunities (30-34) while its opponents convert on 82 percent (32-39).
D-LINE NUMBERS
The OSU defensive line is getting dynamite play from senior end James Cotton and sophomore tackles Mike Collins and Ryan Pickett. All three have soared passed their 1998 totals. Cotton and Collins top all linemen with 48 and 45 stops respectively. Collins ranks second and Cotton third, behind Na’il Diggs, with 10 and nine tackles-for-loss, respectively. Both had sacks vs. Michigan State. Pickett, who recorded his third sack of the season vs. Iowa, has 42 tackles and seven tackles for loss. A fourth lineman – Rodney Bailey – has also topped his 1998 total with 21 tackles on the season. End Brent Johnson has 31 tackles with five tackles-for-loss (three sacks).
SPECIAL TEAMS PLAYS OF THE YEAR
The Buckeyes have blocked three field goal attempts this season (Brent Johnson blocked a game-tieing Purdue attempt with 56 seconds to play and Jason Ott and Nate Clements each had blocks against Penn State). Two Buckeyes have forced fumbles on kickoffs. Percy King opened the Purdue game with a fumble-inducing hit on the opening kickoff. Jerry Westbrooks forced a fourth quarter fumble on a kickoff (that freshman Matt Wilhelm recovered) with the Buckeyes leading Minnesota by three.
OHIO STADIUM HISTORY
Ohio State is playing its home games in grand Ohio Stadium, listed in the National Register of Historic Places, for the 78th season. The team has an all-time record of 326-96-20 at Ohio Stadium.
87th BIG TEN CAMPAIGN FOR OHIO STATE
The 1999 season marks the 87th season of Big Ten Conference football for the Buckeyes, who joined the Western Conference in 1913. The Buckeyes have an all-time Big Ten record of 390-147-24 and have won or shared 28 Big Ten titles, second-most in conference history.
LOTS TO REPLACE FROM 1998
The 1999 Buckeyes are replacing 10 starters from last year, including seven who were selected in the 1999 NFL Draft. Included in the group are four All-Americans – CB Antoine Winfield, SS Damon Moore, SE David Boston and LG Rob Murphy – record-setting quarterback Joe Germaine, flanker Dee Miller, Butkus Award winner Andy Katzenmoyer and punter Brent Bartholomew.
